The Five Times Stephen Said He Couldn't
by Tempeck2
Summary: ... Do Something but Did It Anyway, and The One Time He Didn't Even Hesitate. Sometimes there are things that you just don't want to do, and sometimes it doesn't matter what you want. It's Stephens turn to learn that. :
1. Helen Manipulates

1. **The time he fell for the manipulative Helen Cutter.**

Stephen Hart paced around out side a door. Too afraid to go in, but too intrigued to leave. It's something he should have done... leave. Stephen was not the type of guy to do something so impulsive; so wrong. Moral or otherwise. He knew what he was invited to do; what he wanted so badly to do... was wrong.

'I can't do this. She's my professor.' He thinks for the millionth time as he paces blindly in the hallway leading into his professor's office. 'She's married for God sakes. I can't...'

He suddenly stops and turns toward the door. He has a look of confusion in his eyes, but that look is replaced with one of thoughtfulness.

'...but she did say things hadn't been getting on between her and her husband for the longest time now.' Stephen closes his eyes briefly and shakes his head; as if the shaking would lead to a decision.

'And she does look amazing.' Stephen admitted to himself as he imagined the beautiful visage of Helen Cutter.

He opened his eyes and looked straight at the door. He walks up to it and knocks lightly.

'What are the chances that I'll ever even meet her husband?' He thinks as the figure of Helen Cutter appears when the door opens.

"Stephen your here." Helen says in shock. Obviously she was not aware of the mental battle that had just ensued for her young student. "I thought you had given up on us."

Stephen finally makes that decision and looks at her directly in the eyes. "No..." He says as he moves his hand up to her face and strokes her cheek lightly. "I just had some moral ties that I needed to cut loose."

At that moment, as he was lead into the small but comfortable office, Stephen's only thought had been:

'I shouldn't do this. I mustn't do this. I can't do this... but I will anyway.'


	2. Nick's Assistant

**2. The time he became Nick Cutter's assistant.**

Stephen stood outside the office of Professor Nick Cutter's door. He stood there and stared. He couldn't do it. Not this. Not now. It just seemed all wrong. Nothing had seemed right for ages now, but this seemed too wrong. Even for him.

'I can't do this. I mean this is Professor Nick Cutter. He just lost his wife.' At the thought of the once love of his, Helen Cutter; Stephen could not bring himself to turn from the door.

'Not to mention I slept with her. How will I explain that if it ever comes up in conversation? 'Um... sorry professor, I just sort of slipped... and fell on her... repeatedly.' Yes, that would be brilliant. Just brilliant.' He scowls unintentionally lost in his own little world.

'His assistant? I would be with him all the time. I would work side-by-side with him day in and day out.' He steps back slightly from the door, but stops himself. He gives the door a sad look and thinks, 'Six months ago I thought that I was never going to meet this man, and now I've gone and applied to be his assistant?'

He steps back toward the door and then lifts his hands in frustration. 'This is daft! I've gone completely mental. Of course...' Stephen thinks as he gives the door a thoughtful look. 'others are starting to spread word that he's going insane, but he's not. He's just grieving. Much like I am...'

Stephen finally comes to a reasonable course of action and steps closer to the door. He lifts his hand and knocks. 'He just needs someone to make sure he lives to see another day, and another day, and another day...'

"Yes." Stephen hears as he pushes the door open slightly. He can hear a slight slur in the professor's voice, but thinks absolutely nothing of it.

"Professor..." Stephen asks as he pokes his head in the office. It was much, _much_ more cluttered then that of his old professor's. But he didn't say anything about that either.

"I'm Stephen Hart... Your new assistant..."

Stephen only has one thought running through his mind as he opens the door and walks in:

' I shouldn't do this. I mustn't do this. I can't do this... but I will anyway.'


	3. Stephen Teaches

**3. The time he gave his first lecture in Professor Cutter's absence.**

Stephen stood next to the double doors that lead into one of the many lecture halls in the University. He stood there and watched as student after student piled into the seats. He stood there second after second, minute after minute. He couldn't do it. He couldn't walk into this huge lecture space and just start teaching. It wasn't possible. Not by his standards.

Stephen Hart was many things. He was a student, he was an assistant, For a short time he was a male model, and for an even shorter time he was someone's mister... mistress? Mister. Anyway, the one thing that Stephen Hart knew that he was not, was a Professor.

And yet, a professor was the one thing that he was asked to be at the moment. Stephen stepped back but kept his eyes firmly on the double doors. He starts shaking his head and chuckling. Anyone walking by would probably find him in a very disturbed state.

'I can't do this.' Stephen reasons, ' A few months ago, I was one of those students. I was sitting there with my friends as a fidgety and all together unqualified professor walked in my class and started to mumble out a lesson. I can not do this!'

Stephen starts to pace indigently in front of the doors and steps aside a few times as more and more students walk into the room. It felt like the entire University was there. 'How many kids does he teach anyway?'

Stephen suddenly stops when he remembers the reason that he was in this predicament in the first place. What do you get when you add one Nick Cutter, a grief stricken memory of a lost spouse, and one bottle of Bourbon? An absent professor, of course. Man, those Scottish men can drink.

It wasn't as those Stephen felt that he owed Cutter. Since becoming his assistant, Stephen had actually grown found of being around the man. When Cutter wasn't drunk as a skunk, and Stephen wasn't in the on going battle to fight back the piles of clutter in Cutter's office, they actually had a very enjoyable time together. He could see why Helen and Nick had been married. They were much the same, in many ways.

Stephen snapped out of his musing about his boss when the chime that signaled the start of a class clanged loudly throughout the building.

He regrettably realized that his time was up. It was either, A) Go in to the class, start teaching, make a complete git out of himself, and chalk it up to life experience; or B) Turn around, high-tail it out of there and tell Cutter that he couldn't find the lecture hall at all, "Oh, it was the door that said Evolutionary Zoology? Oh, well that makes a load more sense then what I thought it would be..."

It felt like a no win situation. He had to make a choice...

Stephen Hart moved briskly to the podium that sat at the front of an exceptionally large lecture room, and started to do something he never thought he would have to do in a million years: Teach.

"Hello, My name is Stephen Hart, I am professor Cutter's assistant, and I will be teaching his class today. Can anyone tell me where he last left off on his lecture course?" Regardless of the sweat that was forming on his body, and the twitch that he was sure everyone one could see that he was surely beginning to develop, no one seemed to be surprised, or find it the least bit interesting that he was filling in for Cutter.

A young man, that couldn't be a year or two younger than Stephen himself, raised his hand. Stephen knew what the question was going to be before he even pointed to the kid.

"We were just about to go into the deeper meanings and alienated creatures of the Prehistoric Era." A few other students nodded and most of them got out their text books and started flip through the pages.

Stephen raised his eyebrow, but said nothing. He turned to the board, picked up a piece of chalk, and slowly breathed in. "Very good then, let's begin..."

Stephen only has one thought running through his mind as he fills in for a man that he has started to refer to as not only a professor and mentor, but a friend:

' I shouldn't do this. I mustn't do this. I can't do this... but I will anyway.'


	4. Dinosaur's Roam

**4. The time he followed Nick Cutter into the woods at the mention of the word... Dinosaur.**

Nope, it wasn't possible. There was no way in the known universe that there was such a thing just hanging around. It wasn't possible and Stephen refused to believe it. No matter how undeniably amazing it would be to see a real, live, non-existent, dinosaur roaming around in the forest of Dean, and making unscheduled appearances in a child's bedroom, Stephen absolutely refused to believe it.

No matter how many times the geeky stalker they've acquired, or the extraordinarily beautiful lizard girl, or his very own boss, said that it was possible, he didn't believe it.

It wasn't until he was in the car with Cutter and Connor, on the way back to the forest of Dean, after seeing, cussing out, and subsequently shooting at the 'imaginary' dinosaur, that Stephen finally started to give credit to the idea that maybe this might actually be reality.

It was a hard pill to swallow, but swallow he did. He didn't know if it was before or after the stupid dinosaur knocked him unconscious and went after his friends, that Stephen blew off the rest of the theory that it was some kind of elaborate prank, but eventually he did.

By the time they captured the beast, found the 'portal' or what ever it was that brought the problem there in the first place, that Stephen finally understood the real reason that he went with Cutter so willingly into such a dangerous and utterly mad situation in the first place.

The look in Cutter's eyes when he finally had something to live for again. The hope that shown through all of the sad, weary, depressing-ness that Cutter had gone through after Helen disappeared. It was that emotion, that eagerness, that was the real reason Stephen blindly followed Cutter to the edge of sanity and beyond.

And he would do it again, if it was ever asked of him.

The one thought that was going through Stephen's mind as he stood at edge of an anomaly and his life changed forever was:

' I shouldn't do this. I mustn't do this. I can't do this... but I will anyway.'


	5. Helen Tells

**5. The time after the time Helen Cutter told Nick about the affair she had with her best student.**

He was screwed. Not literally screwed, of course he was almost sure if he gave Helen any more time to share with everyone, she would have told them about all that too.

No, he was friendship screwed. The kind of screwed where you know that feelings had been hurt, trust had been broken, and knowledge that shouldn't have been shared had been shared.

The look that Nick was giving him was unbearable.

It was so long ago. It was so many mistakes ago. It would have... never should have gotten to this point. If he had only told Nick before. If he never would have opened that door, and cut those moral ties, and did the things he did, said the things he said, said the things he didn't say. If only...

It all didn't matter now, there was no going back, no amount of apologies that could make this all blow away.

The looks he was getting from Connor, from Abby, even from the other people that didn't quite know what was going on, (but they were sure it was something unspeakably bad), all of those looks had no bearing on his soul. It was only Nick.

It hurt so much. The kind of pain that would never go away, never get pushed to the back of his heart to be shielded and never spoke of again.

And she just looked so smug. Helen, standing there with her look. The one that said, 'Haha I just ruined your life again, for the umpteenth time, whatcha gonna do about it?' That look.

That hurt too, but in a different way, in a 'I don't really care about you anymore but if I did... harsh much?' That way.

How Stephen wishes that he could just take it all back. That he could turn back time and make all the pain of past mistakes just melt away. But he can't.

He did this. He made these mistakes, and he was going to have to fix them. But how?

As Stephen watched his boss, his mentor, his friend walk by him without a single glance, and give prominence to the idea that this particular mistake would never blow over. Leaving Stephen with a bitter taste in his mouth, and the undeniably difficult question of: should I stay, or should I go.

He took a deep breath, and decided that this was going to be hard, but that he was going to live through it anyway... at least for right now.

Stephen's head dropped as he squeezed his eyes shut. Only one thought came to his mind:

' I shouldn't do this. I mustn't do this. I can't do this... but I will anyway.'


	6. No Hesitation

**+1. The one time he didn't hesitate.**

Stephen Hart was beginning to see the difficulty of their situation. Sure there was about to be a whole lot of wild, prehistoric, dangerous, man-eating animals on the loose, and sure he just meet up with his ex-best friend? And their ex-team, who he was almost positive still wanted to see him dead, after the whole, 'I slept with your wife before we meet, I became your assistant, and befriended you, and then you found out, and... I'm sorry?' thing.

That wasn't even the worst part. The worst part was how hell bent, Nick Cutter was on sacrificing his own life, for a plan that wasn't even sure to work. Where was the military when you needed them?

Situations were becoming difficult. Since leaving the team, to get along by his own devices, Stephen had sunk into a deep depression. It didn't help that every once in a while Helen Cutter would be there to manipulate him, and Nick Cutter would be there to give him that look that said, ' I don't trust you, and you're pretty much dead to me now'.

Depression was a tricky thing. It makes you do crazy stuff.

Maybe that's why he did what he did. Maybe that's why he punched Nick in the face, maybe that's why he ran into the room full o' dinosaurs and pressed that button, maybe that's why he didn't hesitate.

Stephen didn't know if he was making up for the mistakes he made with what he was doing, but he did know that the look was finally gone. Nick was only looking at him with concern and sadness now, but not the kind of 'dead to me' sadness, but the kind of 'don't do this, I forgive you' sadness.

Stephen supposed on some level that, looking back, what he was doing, what he did was probably climbing the crazy scale, but he didn't care.

He was finally forgiven.

All he wanted was for the pain to stop, and if he had to save his friends, save the world, and run headlong into a cage full of man-eating monsters to do it, well then that was just his luck.

It wasn't easy being pals.

As Stephen Hart smiled a sad, heart breaking farewell to his best friend Nick Cutter, one thought came to his mind:

' I should do this. I must do this. I can do this... and I will.'

-fini-


	7. AN

**This author's note is to disclaim this entire story, Meaning I don't own the Characters or the show, and it's to Thank You for reading my story. I always thought that Stephen got sort of a bad rap for not being one of the more interesting characters of the show, but I always liked him a lot. Anyway, Thanks again.**

**-bye! :)**


End file.
